STANFORD MARSHMALLOW AND PRISON EXPERIMENTS

 I misidentified one of my photos yesterday, indicating that I thought they were chicken feet:

A friend sent me to another site which showed this photo as that of weird lemons:

Makes sense because in Chinatown here they would never place chicken feet next to tomatoes.  Sorry, but I did say "I think these are chicken feet."

This friend also sent me this video of the Stanford Prison Experiment, and asked if I was familiar with this study.  My answer is no, but here are the details:

• In 1971 Stanford psychology professor Philip Zimbardo received a grant from the U.S. Office of Naval Research to conduct a role-play simulation of a prison on campus to determine the psychological effects of prisoners and guards.

• 
  You can read the details in Wikipedia.
• Planned for a period of two weeks, Zimbardo terminated the effort after six days because of some outrage and parents' concerns.
• In short, for decades to follow, this controversial Stanford Prison Experiment was criticized as being deeply flawed and a lie, among other comments, decrying the methodology and ethics.
• Yet, the experiment did illustrate cognitive dissonance theory and the power of authority.
• 
  In 2002 there was a BBC Prison Study to examine Zimbardo's themes of tyranny and resistance, and became a documentary series called The Experiment.
• The findings were very different.
• There was no evidence of guards conforming to the natural role, and increased resistance of prisoners.
• A whole slew of subsequent papers also challenged the contention of Zimbardo.

• 
  Zimbardo, who earned his PhD from Yale, and had already taught at New York University and Columbia before joining the Stanford Faculty in 1968, went on to fashion a successful academic career, including writing The Lucifer Effect and gaining kudos for his work on shyness, anti-bullying and various charitable activities.  
• He retired in 2003 and remains somewhat active at the age of 88.

Just around the same time, another Stanford psychologist, Walter Mischel, ran  the Stanford Marshmallow Test, suggesting that self-discipline at an early age (4-5) can lead to later success.  I later found a review entitled 40 Years of Stanford Research Found That People With This One quality Are More Likely to Succeed.  I've found that this Power of Delayed Gratification worked for me.  To quote:

The children who were willing to delay gratification and waited to receive the second marshmallow ended up having higher SAT scores, lower levels of substance abuse, lower likelihood of obesity, better responses to stress, better social skills as reported by their parents, and generally better scores in a range of other life measures.

Does this mean that a child who can't delay gratification will ultimately fail in life?  Well, maybe not.  A 2020 study challenged the original contention.  Yet, that paper came from the Templeton World Charity Foundation, and is linked to a philosophy that is steeped in conservative religion.  Science has been critical of much that the Templeton Prize offers.  But what has religion to do with psychology and success or not?  Philosophers have long wrestled with that question.

Oh well, that is too much thinking for today.  So let me end with life at 15 Craigside, which integrates Ikebana with Chinese New Year, sunsets and flowers, starting with my first water lily of the season, followed by some wonderful arrangements of Irene's students:

Notice in the background a painting titled Good Fortune.

Which leads to our celebration of the Chinese New Year.  There are at least ten ways to spell this, but most in Hawaii say Gung Hei Fat Choy.  However, this literally means May You Be Prosperous and Happy.  The correct way to say Happy Chinese New Year is, in Mandarin, Xin Nian Kuai Le, and in Cantonese, Sun Nin Fai Lok.

On February 1 we had our annual Chinese New Year Lunch.

We had jai, char siu pork and fried rice, hoisin ribs, lup chong steamed fish and rice cake, plus Johnnie Walker Black label and beer.

Then, also celebrating the Chinese New Year, went to Happy Days to pick up a Peking Duck package for a sunset meal on my lanai.

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